


There's a raccoon in my tower

by Woozletania



Series: There's a raccoon in my tower [2]
Category: Guardians of the Galaxy (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-20
Updated: 2018-06-14
Packaged: 2019-05-09 10:09:52
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 11,084
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14714078
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Woozletania/pseuds/Woozletania
Summary: Nursed back to health by an unlikely ally, Tony Stark returns to earth to find a very clever something (Fox?  Rabbit?  Raccoon? it depends who you ask) has set up shop in one of his labs.Prequel and (eventually) Sequel to "What happened to the rabbit?"





	1. Chapter 1

“What now?”

Tony couldn't bring himself to look up. There was so little of Peter left. Just ashes, crumbling away to dust. He tried to hold onto it only for even the dust to dissipate. It was as though his young charge never existed at all. Quill, Drax, Mantis, it happened to them as well, but a few yards away. Peter died in his arms.  


"I said, what now?"

Tony looked up at the blue alien cyborg. So much of her was metal. Even the flesh might be fake. A robot, a synthezoid like Vision? Or had she started out like him and had her flesh cut away?

"I don't know."

"Your back is still bleeding."

"Yeah." Tony sprayed that wound, too, with nanofoam. It kept him alive. He'd anticipated using it on wounds and it was smart enough to enter the wound - thankfully painlessly - and keep him from bleeding to death on the inside. He was still hurt. Weak. In shock.  


"Get up. I'm Nebula. Your name?"

Tony took the metal hand she offered and climbed painfully to his feet. "Tony. Tony Stark."

"Stark," Nebula said. "Thanos mentioned you. When you flew the missile through the portal and destroyed the battleship he sent to pacify Earth you became an interest of his. He respects strength and intellect."

"Great." Tony looked around. All was ruin, rubble. Corroded metal and crushed rock. Thanos had dropped a moon on them. It was a miracle anyone survived. Survived until...what had happened?

"What did he do?" He gestured at the rubble. Faint dark smears were all that remained of the dead. "Just...gone."

"The stones," Nebula said. "This is why he wanted them. Individually they are devastating. Together they can affect the very fabric of the universe. He used them to wipe out half of all life. Everywhere."

"Everywhere." Tony stumbled. Little of his armor was left. He was just a man now, injured and weak. "Everywhere in the universe?"

"That's right." He was almost out on his feet. He barely noticed she was leading him through the rubble until he looked up and saw Quill's red spaceship.  


It was damaged, holed by chunks of debris pulled down when Thanos threw the moon at them. The wings on one side were ripped away but the main cabin was intact. Tony blinked at the sudden dark as she led him into the shadow of the vessel. With the hand not leading him she tapped out a code on a panel and a ramp lowered.

"So you're one of these...Guardians?"

"Sometimes."

He collapsed gratefully into a seat in the cockpit. There were six primary seats and a couple of pull-down ones in back. Almost delirious from injury and pain Tony chucked as he saw how one seat had stirrups and built-up sides and back to make it suitable for a half-sized pilot.

"Child seat?"

"Shut up." Nebula brought a medical kit from somewhere and opened it. Inside were a variety of surgical tools and gear, most of it unfamiliar. It amused him to see one neatly racked set of tools was half the size of the others.

"That's Rocket's seat," Nebula said as he gave him an injection. "No-Shock. I only have basic medical training but with this gear I can heal most of your damage. Drink this."

For several minutes she tended to him. Trusting the cyborg not to kill him - she could have done so easily as he sat in a daze holding Peter's ashes - the advanced medical gear soon had an impact. With the hand not stuck full of needles Tony grabbed a tool kit from a slot near 'Rocket's' seat. Inside were more half-sized tools.

Some were gleaming, professionally made, but most were clearly handmade...by someone he suddenly wanted to meet. Nothing was overengineered. Every tool was simple, practical, but though some had unknown functions he could see the mind at work. Whoever made them was very, very good at his job.

"Rocket must be their mechanic." Tony respectfully returned the tool bag to its slot.

"That's right. Now don't leave the ship. There's food there," she nodded to a cabinet, "Relief station and shower there," she gestured at a door. "I think I can get the ship working. It'll take a day or two, though."

She pulled a harness, backpack and some sort of spray nozzle from a rack. Tony suspected an alien form of his own nanospray. She had to let the harness out from its inhumanly tight settings to put it on.

He was right. He watched from the windows as the blue cyborg began to repair the ship. The nozzle built the metal back up as though programmed with the ship's schematics. It almost certainly was. Tony turned his attention to the cockpit and ship.

Some of the mechanisms were obvious in their use. Others less so. With his strength recovering Tony looked around. Racks of weapons, space suits - if that's what they really were - no larger than his hand, fuel tanks, engines. Controls in alien script for piloting, weapons. Tony drank it all in. As his strength returned he tried to understand the ship and its equipment. Not all of the tech was incomprehensible. He'd analyzed enough Sakaaran equipment to see the similarities.

He also noted the narrow cabin doors...and the half-height door squeezed in under a stairwell. The handle was still a handle, even on an alien ship, and inside was a tiny room crammed full of tools and weapons. There was barely room for a patched and careworn red...pet bed? Embroidered on the side facing the door was 'Rocket' and a symbol he'd seen elsewhere on the ship. One point down, seven up. An animal musk filled the little room.

"Don't touch anything in there," Nebula said from the ramp. She snapped a cylinder free from the backpack and replaced it with one from a rack. "Rocket sets traps. He doesn't like his things touched."

"Neither do I." He took a last look around and closed the door. "I wonder if he survived."

Another curious thing was the leaves and twigs he found scattered around the ship. A collection of them occupied another, human-sized cabin, growing over the walls. All were dry and dead. A stack of tablets, some obviously games, occupied a shelf. "Let me guess, another Guardian is a plant creature."

"Groot," Nebula said. "Get some rest. Pick a cabin. When you're more recovered you can help me fix the ship."

There was little else to do. Tony found a bed big enough for him - only Rocket was half-sized among the Guardians - and stretched out. The day had been a nightmare. He could only hope tomorrow would be better.

He thought he wouldn't be able to sleep. Too much horror, too much death. His body had other ideas. He was asleep almost before he lay down his head.


	2. Heavy lifting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Far from Earth, Tony and Nebula work to get their ship flying again. The sooner they get back to Earth, the sooner they can get about the serious work of killing Thanos.

"Can you lift that wing?"

"Of course I can." Nebula bent and straightened, metal creaking in her grip as she lifted the Benatar's lower starboard wing. Tony patched up the main struts with the repair gun as quickly as he could. Nebula got cranky if he dawdled over work while she was hoisting something.

Well, crankier, anyway. "Get a move on, Stark. The sooner we get off this rock the sooner I can find my father and kill him."

She had a point. He had been lingering over a weld as he glanced at her. Her patchwork of cybernetics fascinated him. It was obvious, now that he was recovered enough to use his brain properly, that her cybernetics were installed not all at once but piecemeal. Different sections of them used various metals and constructions as though they were done by separate doctors using their own techniques and technologies. The one time he asked she snapped at him, so it remained a mystery. Had Thanos done this to her?

"Okay, it's braced. I can get the rest without you holding it."

Nebula nodded curtly and disappeared into the ship. They were working on two separate projects and she emerged only when he needed her.

Half an hour later he returned to the ship, swapped out a nanospray canister for a new one and set the backpack down. He'd managed to form what was left of his armor into a breastplate, but there wasn't enough for an exoskeleton. He was mostly recovered from his injuries but he got tired like any man without the full suit. Tempting as it was to see if the nano-spray canisters held compatible material for his armor he simply hadn't the time to experiment. They'd been working on the Benatar sixteen hours a day. 

Nebula was up to her armpits in a console, surrounded by masses of wire and connectors. A motley selection of parts, many handmade, bound it all together. Rocket was not one for standardization. The things he built or repaired worked damn well but he was probably the only one who knew where everything was. That was fine as long as the little whatever-he-was was around. It made their work harder, though.

Nebula said they'd have the ship fixed in a few days. They'd been at it for two weeks now. Their initial look-over had missed punctures to the fuel tanks and engine damage, among other things. They'd had to scavenge fuel and parts from her crashed ship to get as far as they did.

Nebula's cybernetics whined as she slid back into view. She slapped a control and a floating screen popped up.

"It's about time." She slid into the chair and tapped at the screen. "Rocket, come in. Rocket." She waited, then shrugged. "He's probably dead. Groot. Groot, come in."

Still nothing. "I don't know why I bothered. I'd just get 'I am Groot' back anyway. Eclector, come in. This is Nebula."

The response from the speaker was gibberish but Nebula nodded. Her translator let her speak to and understand Tony but the same could not be said of distant voices.

"Kraglin, good. I was beginning to think everyone was dead." More gibberish. "Gamora, Quill, Drax and Mantis are all gone. Ashed when Thanos used the Stones. I don't know about Rocket and Groot. They weren't here."

The conversation went on for another minute before she cut the connection and turned to Tony. "All right. We have a backup plan if we need it. Kraglin can bring the Guardian's base ship here if we can't get the Benatar going. He's tied up at the moment, though. He and the remaining crew are running relief supplies to Xandar. It got hit harder than other worlds. Thanos wiped out half the population and then half of the survivors were ashed. The government is in a shambles and the outer colonies are sending supplies until it stabilizes."

"You realize I have no idea what Xandar is, right?"

Nebula waved the protest away. "With the fuel loss we don't have much range. You want to go to Terra, we'll go there. When Kraglin is free he'll come pick me up or drop off fuel."

And so two days later, with the ship bolted together to the bare minimum for flight, Nebula sat down and with visible unease hit the Engines Start control. Thankfully, they started, wobbling them up out of the atmosphere into naked space.

Having spent much of the last two weeks handing Nebula tools to repair the hyperdrive Tony held his breath once more as she set course for the jump point. He'd learned a lot about the ship and its technologies and knew what they were doing wasn't safe. The power requirements for a jump were considerable and if they'd connected one component wrong they and the ship would vanish in a blinding flash.

"It's about time," Tony breathed as they dropped into hyperspace. "The sooner we get to Earth..."

"The sooner we kill Thanos," Nebula said. For the first time since he'd met her she smiled. It was not a friendly smile. "I know you lost your son. But no one wants Thanos dead more than me."

_He wasn't my son,_ Tony didn't say. "Did he do that to you?"

"Shut up." She returned her attention to the screen. "Twelve jumps. We have fuel for thirteen, but we need to take it slow. Hopefully nothing will go wrong between here and Terra."

Nothing did. Tony expected to find a troubled world when they got there. He was right. Upon their arrival Tony would learn about the Battle of Wakanda, the devastation the Snap caused across the globe...and about the furry little alien holed up in one of his labs.


	3. "No one's making planet killers in my tower."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Back on Earth, Tony soon learns about the furry little alien camped out in one of his labs. That wouldn't be much of a worry if it weren't for the things the raccoon keeps sending out the door.

The expected drama accompanied his return to Earth. An orbital station that identified itself as SWORD targeted them as soon as they dropped out of jump. Fortunately he knew the SWORD commander, one Agent Brand, and she warmly welcomed him back. It seemed that Earth had put everything that would fly into space right after the attack and SWORD was a conglomeration of defense agencies, stations and equipment. Better than nothing, Tony supposed, even if the barn door had been closed well after the horses escaped.

Sadly he got a less cheerful reception when they landed at Avengers Compound. Pepper was there to meet him and tore a long and painful strip off his hide regarding his boarding an alien ship and disappearing for nearly a month.

SHIELD was back in play, though badly undermanned (but who wasn't) and their techs were eager to tear into the Benatar. Tony and Nebula sat down with Pepper to catch up.

"Thor showed up during the Battle of Wakanda," Pepper said. "He had a new axe and almost managed to kill Thanos. Rocket and Groot came with him but Groot was ashed when Thanos used the stone. So were Bucky, T'challa, Sam, Wanda and half of the world's population."

"Rocket," Tony said. "I've been in a Rocket-scented ship for a week. He slept in a little pet bed and is a damn fine mechanic but I still have no idea what he looks like."  
"He's a fox." Nebula spoke up for the first time.

"No, he's a raccoon," Pepper shot back.

"Whatever," the blue cyborg said. "He's little and angry and he sometimes works on my cybernetics, and Gamora's. He's also a cyborg. An illegal lab made him out of some lower animal."

"So he's literally a raccoon? There's a raccoon in my tower?"

Stark tower, formerly Avengers tower, was back in use. The worldwide troubles caused by the loss of half the human race meant that technological hubs were of critical importance. Stark Tower was too well equipped to lie idle.

Pepper shrugged. "Thor vouched for him after the Battle of Wakanda. Rocket hitched a ride back here and asked to see one of our labs. That's the last we saw of him. He locked himself in."

"Rocket doesn't have many friends," Nebula said. "Losing Groot and the other Guardians...if he knows about that, I'm not sure what he will do."

The answer appeared to be "lock himself in a lab and make stuff." After a much needed change of clothes and a shower for Tony (not in that order) they went to Stark Tower, arriving just in time to see the light blink in the hallway outside Special Projects Lab 4. Techs came running and Tony had to stop them carrying off assorted crates and cases so he could have a look.

"Energy weapons," he said after opening the first. No two of them were quite the same. They had the familiar handmade look he'd come to associate with Rocket's work, though clearly some of the parts were machined as opposed to being crafted by the raccoon's clever little hands. There were enough in this one crate to equip a squad, complete with spare power cells and a diagram hand-written on one wall of the crate showing how to recharge them.

"Gauss rifles over here," Nebula said from her crate.

"Okay, you," Tony said, and snapped his fingers a couple of times. "Flarkins."

"Falkins, sir," said the tech with the longsuffering air of one who's seen his name misspelled every conceivable way.

"Falkins, right. So every time the door opens this sort of thing is in here?"

"Yes, sir. We bring in crates of scrap and the raccoon makes this stuff out of it. Last time there was a big box with a bomb in it. 'For Thanos' was written on the side. I hear Thor used the Bifrost to drop it on one of Thanos's bases."

"Pepper?"

"That's right, Tony. Thor dropped it and watched from a distance. He said the planet the base was on imploded."

"Cascading singularity generator," Nebula said without looking up from the cases she was examining. "Kree planet killer. The fox must have learned to make them somehow." She took a couple of small objects from a case and slipped them into a pouch. "Plasma grenades here."

"No one's making planet killers in my tower," Tony said firmly. He walked over the door at the inner end of the hall and thumped on it with a fist. "This is my tower, whatever-you-are. Open up."

"Tony," Pepper said. "Let him work. There's so much to do. The whole world is in a shambles and we need everyone to fix it. Especially you."

"Fine," Tony said doubtfully. "But the minute I'm free I'm going in there and have a talk with him."

But he didn't. Tony was soon so busy he simply didn't have time. All he could do was inventory the gear that came out of the lab, sending the really dangerous stuff off into space for storage, and spare an occasional thought for the furry little techie camped out in his lab. One of these days he'd look into it. One of these days.

'One of these days' turned out to be two months later.


	4. The recluse

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tony finally meets the hermit living in his tower.

Then came the day when Thor came to the tower, picnic basket in hand. Tony knew he'd been by several times before, but they were both so busy it was pure luck they ended up in the same place at the same time.

"Thor! New haircut!"

The thunder god allowed himself a slight smile. Had his eyes always been different colors? He should know this, Tony knew, but he didn't. Thor's outfit and weapon were new, too, but those were less of a surprise. He'd seen the footage from Wakanda.

"Just stopping by to see a friend," Thor said.

"And I'm not a friend?" Tony inclined his head toward the meeting room and Thor obliged by taking a seat.

"What did you bring me?" Tony was not surprised by the sharp look Thor shot him as he reached for the basket. "Oh. Right. For your raccoon."

"He is not 'my raccoon.' He is my friend. You'd do well to remember that."

"Joke, Thor. Joke." Tony leaned back in his chair. "I still haven't met him. He won't let anyone in except you."

He idly lifted the lid of the picnic basket and glanced inside. There was an awful lot of food in there for someone who slept in a little pet bed. 

Thor spoke up. "Rocket has lost much. He works to forget his pain."

"Yeah." Tony knew that one all too well. "If you could get him to come out and meet us, I'd like to discuss some of the things he makes. I know more of the technology now but some of what he sends out is still a mystery."

"I don't know if I can get him to come out. But if you have something to add to the...'picnic', I think it's called..."

Tony leaned back in his chair. "Friday, if we have a runner, send them to Charlie's and get some food. The usual assortment. Get it in a picnic basket."

"Charlie's deli? That's where I go too."

"Yeah, I recognize the basket."

Friday broke in. "Should I inform Pepper, Tony?"

"Yeah. Yeah you should, Friday. She was dealing with this before I got back, she deserves to know what's happening in there."

An hour later, joined by Pepper and Nebula, who arrived with her, the three of them waited in the little entry hall. Thor, with a picnic basket in one hand and flat of bottled water under the opposite arm, looked up at the ceiling.

"Rabbit," he said, and Tony and Nebula shared a look. "This is Tony Stark and Pepper, who own this building. You know Nebula. Let them join us for our meal. I promise I won't make you sleep if you let them in."

Tony and Pepper glanced quizzically at each other as the door opened. Make him sleep?

The door opened into a broad, shadowy chamber. Special Projects Lab Four looked bigger in the dark. Pinpoint sources of light illuminated racks of industrial equipment hard at work making parts. They breathed in the built-up animal musk of a raccoon who hadn't bathed or left the room in months. Over the machinery noise came music from hidden speakers.

"Is that the Beatles? It sounds like the Beatles."

"Close, Tony." Pepper was looking around the room. "George Harrison."

"This way," Thor said.

They passed by a nook between towering equipment racks. Bright overheads lit a short stretch of counter occupied by several flower pots and a watering can. Dead brown twigs protruded from the pots.

"Don't touch that," Thor and Nebula said simultaneously as Tony reached out. Nebula went so far as to slap Tony's hand as he lifted it.

"What? Is he into flower arranging?"

"Shut up, Stark," Nebula hissed.

Finally they got a glimpse of the room's sole occupant. A slender figure moved in the dim glow of point source lights. A dozen hovering screens covered with schematics and diagrams surrounded a long work bench and a single chair. The figure on the chair turned.

"Wow," Tony muttered. "He really is a raccoon." It was no surprise he got Pepper's elbow in his ribs as a reward. An upright, large raccoon, but still a raccoon no taller than Tony's hip.

"Axe guy," Rocket said to Thor. He looked at Tony suspiciously. "I know who you are. Don't touch nothin'." He glanced at Pepper. "Potts. You got any more scans like those others, I can use them."

Finally he looked at Nebula. His ears went down and he sagged in his chair. "Nebula. Sorry about...about your sister. She was the first ta go, I know. Then all of a sudden..."

His little clawed hands shook for a moment. He drew strength from somewhere and set down the tool he was holding as he slid out of the seat. "Okay. We're here to eat. Let's eat. Then I can get back ta work."

There was only bare metal floor to sit on, but still they sat. Thor and Pepper pulled food out of the baskets. One little clawed hand went unerringly to a cellophane-covered bowl of applesauce and slid it over to Nebula. In turn Nebula reached out.

Rocket flinched as her metal fingers touched his nape, then settled down. Without another word Rocket tore into the food like a starving man, and even Tony had the sense not to comment on how Nebula gently petted the raccoon as he ate. Nor did he say a word about the obviously slept-in pet bed under the work bench. This one didn't have 'Rocket' embroidered on it.

The gentle sound of machinery and the ever changing musical background from what Tony recognized a Zune on the work beach surrounding them they sat down and ate. With the exception of polite grunts as food was passed around, It was half an hour before anyone spoke.


	5. The most dangerous man

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Over a picnic meal Tony gets a look at what Rocket has been building in his lab.

Tony had never seen someone so small eat so much in such a short time. Rocket ate with his little clawed hands and fangs, sniffing at then tearing into one dish after another. Most of a roast chicken, a bowl of potato salad, a dish of cherries and a stick of garlic bread disappeared into the little raccoon before he drank half a bottle of water, burped loudly, then went right back to eating.

Occasionally he nosed at something and rather than ripping into it he slid the dish to Nebula. That ended up being the applesauce, a jar of grape jam and a Tupperware dish of tuna salad. Nebula ate sparingly of each, taking no more food than a child and much less than the hungry raccoon. It wasn't hard to guess why. There was so little flesh left among her cybernetics that there couldn't be room for much of a digestive system or need for one.

Thor ate more than Rocket but weighed at least five times as much. He also grinned and belched in reply whenever Rocket did, making sure to outdo his little friend in volume. Tony and Pepper together ate less than the Thunder god. That gave Tony time to peer around the room. Rocket was too busy eating to do more than shoot him the occasional suspicious glance.

In the background of it all was the music. Always the music. No one commented on it but throughout the meal the Zune on the workbench fed sound to hidden speakers. Tony suspected it was Quill's, for the age of the songs smacked of the rogue's retro mindset. Footloose was right in line with Fleetwood Mac, Norman Greenbaum, David Bowie, the Jackson Five, ELO, Cat Stevens and more. It wasn't loud but it was always there.

Almost everything in sight had the handmade look he'd come to associate with Rocket. How one little raccoon could build so much in just a few months escaped him. There was some automation, like the assembly line stamping out parts. Maybe some of the equipment was similarly machine made.

Racks of tools, half-built weapons, stacks of parts all had a look of clutter that he knew was an illusion. A master craftsman leaves each item just where he wants it to be. He imagined the response if someone tidied up. "Don't touch my stuff." The mantra of the technician.

There was something he assumed was a recycling system the little raccoon presumably made so he wouldn't need to connect to the building's water and sewer lines. Much more interesting was the hulking shape looming in the shadows nearby. Thor was interested in it too but wouldn't stop eating to look it over. Tony was not so shy but when he went to stand Thor put his hand on his knee.

"Afterwards," the thunder god murmured. They went back to eating and to pretending not to notice when Nebula reached out to pet Rocket in between bites. Tony never imagined the bitter cyborg and angry raccoon being friends until he saw how they treated each other. Each cared about the other and showed by action what they'd never admit out loud.

Pepper couldn't resist reaching out to pet him as well but held back and when Rocket shot her a glare and bared his fangs. It seemed not everyone got to pet the raccoon.

When Rocket had eaten most of the contents of Thor's picnic basket the raccoon belched again and sat back, his belly noticeably rounder than before. He must have put away a quarter his body weight in one sitting. It didn't escape anyone that only a famished man - or raccoon - ate like that.

"The deal was that you were to eat, Rocket," was the first thing out of Thor's mouth when they were all done feasting. "You don't eat like a well fed person."

"I do eat," the raccoon snapped. "Look!" He pointed at a pile of empty foam food containers in the corner. "They put food in when I send stuff out, I eat it."

Thor looked the raccoon over, unconvinced. "You do look a little better. But when was the last time you sent something out?"

"I dunno," Rocket said. "Haven't had as much stuff lately. Nothing works on Thanos. I sent out everything I know how ta make and he's still alive." He slouched where he sat. "Nothing works on that guy."

Thor opened his mouth but Tony stuck his foot in. "How do you know how to make all this, Rocket?"

Rocket laughed harshly. "The usual way someone like me learns. Head stuffed full of Uplift processors and a helmet clamped on my head feeding in what they want me ta know. They wanted a soldier who could build and repair his own gear. So they built one. Or a prototype of one anyway. Other stuff I picked up after I escaped."

Tony winced. It was as bad as he's expected. "Well, if you want a job, I'm hiring. Or if you'd just meet with me and a few others to do an info exchange."

"Got everything I need right here," Rocket said. "I just gotta figure out something Thanos isn't immune to. I collapsed a planet and took chunks out a two more and he's still alive. Nothing works on the blue bastard."

Thor steered the conversation back on track. "Pepper, do you know how often Rocket has sent things out recently?"

"About every two or three days," she said. "I should have realized that was a problem. I'm sorry Thor, we've been so busy."

"New rule, Rocket," Thor said firmly. "You're going to let them send food in every day. You're not going to get lost in your work and starve again if I have anything to say about it."

"Fine," Rocket said after a jaw-cracking yawn. "Whatever. You gonna go so I can get back ta work?"

"In a minute," Tony interjected. "What's with the power armor?"

They turned to look at the Hulkbuster-sized figure in the shadows. As usual the lighting was dim to favor the nocturnal raccoon but it could be nothing but a power suit, and the Rocket-sized compartment in the front left no doubt who the pilot would be.

"Eh," Rocket shrugged. "If I can't kill him with a bomb maybe I can at least get a few punches in. From that footage Potts sent me he likes a good fight." He yawned again, visibly struggling to stay awake after the heavy meal and who knows how much missed sleep. "He coulda killed you ten different ways with the Stones but he went hand ta hand. Likes to fight." He supported his muzzle on his hands as he stared at the hovering screens with drooping eyelids "I'll get him..."

Tony had been in his place. Sometimes the need to invent kept him up for days. Rocket was running on determination and rage but he didn't have Jarvis or Friday to make sure he ate or slept. Thor was worried Rocket would wither away at his workbench and he was right to do so. Even now, after what Tony knew were several food-laden visits, Rocket was skinnier than he probably should be.

Rocket was so exhausted he only muttered a protest when Thor picked him up and slid him into the padded pet bed. The thunder god gestured with his chin and they filed out lest they wake the little mechanic from his much needed rest. Tony lingered by the power armor but barely had time for a look before Thor chased him out. Each waited until they were past the entry corridor - surely loaded with cameras and microphones - to speak. When the ever-present music was finally cut off by the closing doors Pepper spoke up.

"He's like a little kid," Pepper said sadly. "A hurt little kid trying not to think about what he lost."

"A very dangerous, very angry little kid," Tony agreed. 

“There's nothing more dangerous than a man who has nothing left to lose,” Thor said somberly.

Pepper and Thor shared a brief exchange but he missed it. Something was nagging at him. Something about the power armor.

"...only family he ever had," Nebula was saying as he awoke from his thoughts. "And Groot was his son in all but name."

"Nebula," he said, and the blue cyborg fixed him with a look. "Did you see the purple conduits built into that power suit?"

She shrugged. "Yes. Jump drive. Personal teleporters aren't unheard-of but they are rare. Maybe he thinks it'll surprise my father. Why?"

"I don't know," Tony said. "Something about it bugs me. Did you get any scans, Friday?"

"No sir," said the voice from the ceiling. "A damping field was in place, probably for your benefit. I did get some video and snapshots through your chest unit, though."

"All right," Tony said. "Mock up what you can in Lab Two. I'll be by in a bit."

"Is there a problem, Stark?"

"I don't know yet, Thor. Maybe."

Tony was being cautious. In his heart he knew something was very wrong. He just didn't know what it was yet.


	6. Interlude in a lab

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tony and Rocket try to figure out what's bugging them about Rocket's half-built Thanosbuster armor.

"Friday, show me what you got."

Special Projects Lab Two was more of a projection booth than an actual lab. It was only five by ten paces, for one thing. But in that small space was concentrated a lot of processing power and holoemitters on every surface. My Holodeck, Tony sometimes jokingly called it.

A bulky figure materialized in the middle of the room, building up from a grid to a glowing semisolid suit of armor. It was at least as large as the Hulkbusters but simpler in design. Fewer plates made up its outer armor but those plates were thick with armor - presumably the same incredibly tough energized alloy Rocket had somehow turned Lab Four's door into. The whole thing had a clunky, medieval feel far less polished than Tony's current Hulkbuster, much less the nanotech suit.

But Tony knew he shouldn't underestimate it. The same mind that made this suit built a bomb that collapsed a whole planet into a singularity, then somehow created antimatter and neutron star matter in the lab to use for two more bombs. All to kill Thanos. None had worked. After those three and the nanowire grid net Rocket built to dice the Titan into bite sized-cubes, but which hadn't, nothing had got near Thanos. Two recent bombs had simply vanished on the way down.

"Well, at least they didn't show up here with a sparking fuse," Tony muttered as he studied the Thanosbuster suit. The thing needed a name, after all.

Nebula was the only one to follow him to the lab. Thor was off to some disaster in Malaysia and Pepper had all too much on her plate. The cyborg sat tinkering with her mechanical left hand. She looked up as Tony walked to the "suit". 

It was different here than in Lab Four. There was no music and of course the place didn't smell like a raccoon who hadn't bathed or left the room in three months. It was also much better lit. It was a lot easier to make out details.

"Friday, open it up as best you can."

The front of the thing was a series of armor slabs hinged at the sides. It'd been partly open, revealing the Rocket-sized control compartment inside, and the armored doors swiveled open. Fuzzy gray areas showed where no information on the suit was available but a surprising amount rendered as Friday used still images and video from Tony's brief walk past to guesstimate the interior design.  


"All right. This exo-frame is for muscle amplification. Linear armature motors or the equivalent outside that. Hand controls here, screens around his head, controls for his...muzzle? Tongue?" Tony dismissed the confusion of blurry metal spurs as unimportant. What he really wanted to see was elsewhere.

"Power cell, right?" Tony pointed at a half-rendered green sphere the size of a man's head. Nebula nodded.

"Yes. These are storage cells. They don't use fuel like the Benatar but store a great deal of energy once full charged."

"Four, no, five of them around the control cockpit. How long could this suit run on them?"

Nebula shrugged. "Weeks, at least. There may be more we don't see but this is more than enough power."

" 'More than enough'." Tony thought she'd say something like that. "All right, weapons."

Again, the weapons were simpler and less flexible than the ones in his current suit. They were nonetheless lethal. Each finger of the five-digited hands sported a retracted razor-sharp metal claw. The left arm had a built-in extendable sword as well and the front of the not at all raccoon shaped armored head was spiked for headbutts. Both arms mounted cannons, one with the now familiar knobby shape of a Gauss accelerator, the other some sort of energy projector. Each shoulder of the hunchbacked suit mounted further weapons and ports all over it were too much like propulsion exhausts to be anything else. Like Rocket, the suit's arms and legs were the same length, making it clear it could run on all fours and still use the shoulder and back-mounted weapons, plus fly if need be.

So: mobile, heavily armored and armed...but with far more power than it appeared to need.

"Nebula," Tony said again. This time she stepped closer. "Tell me what you see." He pointed at the grid of purple cables visible through joints of the suit. Unlike the interior they had good, clear images of the exterior.

"Jump drive," Nebula said. "I told you. Personal teleporters are rare but not unheard-of. They are usually short ranged, a few miles at most, since they have to generate their own hyperfield instead of using pre-built jump points."

"See anything odd?"

She studied the visible portions of the suit. "There seems to be a great deal more power than is needed. Any one of these cells should power the suit for a week or more. And look," she pointed at a rounded bulge in each massive, armored thigh, "Probably two more here."

Tony tapped his foot. He was sure he wasn't imagining it. "Tell me about the jump drive in that alien pod you used to get to Titan." He'd been in that pod almost as much as the Benatar as they scavenged parts to repair the Guardian's damaged ship.

"That was a necrocraft, a Sakaaran...wait," she said, and was silent for a moment. "...The conduits were a quarter this bulky in my pod. These are as massive as the ones in the Benatar. This is too much for the suit. Far too much."

"The word you are looking for is 'over engineered'," Tony said. "What do you think the chances are that Rocket built them like this out of habit, not considering he didn't need a tenth this much jump power?"

The silence lingered. "That's what I thought. How much do you know about jump drives and hyperspace, Nebula?"

"Enough to repair and fly a ship. I couldn't design or build one."

"Who knows enough to do that?"

"Rocket," they said together.

"Something's wrong here," Nebula said, unknowingly echoing Tony's earlier thought. She frowned, pulled an alien device from her belt and set it on the control console for the holodisplay. "Kraglin," she said.

After a moment the face of a scruffy-looking man sporting a short Mohawk appeared above the device. There was a burst of gibberish as he spoke and Nebula adjusted a control. Thankfully this resulted in a translation. She must not have cared if Tony could follow along last time.

"...Still busy as hell at my end," 'Kraglin' said. "The whole galaxy, hell, prob'ly the universe is a mess. Four new wars broke out just this week as races saw losing half of everyone's population as an advantage. The Kree and Shi'ar are -"

"Kraglin," Nebula broke in. "I need to talk to your chief engineer."

"Yeah, he's there with you, right? Angry little furry guy."

Nebula sighed and pinched her eyes together. "Whoever works on the Quadrant's drives when he's not around. And didn't get ashed."

"A'ight, just a sec."

Some time later another humanoid alien replaced Kraglin in the holo. This one had a feathery crest projecting back from his head and a massive scar that ran across one probably cybernetic eye. "Ralis here. Cap'n says you need something?"

"Ralis," Tony said. "What would happen if you fed a jump drive much more power than it needs?"

"Happens," said the Shi'ar. "Battle damage, that sort of thing. You try to jump and it'll collapse the jump point. Kills you dead of course. Then someone has to come and build a new jump point. Sometimes gets done on purpose during wartime."

"What would happen if you weren't on a warp point? Say, on a planet's surface?"

The Shi'ar thought about that. "That doesn't usually work. A planet's gravity well suppresses a jump field. You'd need way more power than a ship usually has."

This time Nebula spoke up. "What if you built a system just to force power into a jump rig on a planet's surface?"

"Well, that depends," the engineer replied. "How big a hole in the universe were you planning to rip?"

After a few more questions Nebula broke the connection and the two studied the suit. Whole pieces of outer armor were missing, exposing the half-built interior of the left leg. Conduit and cable protruded from other hatches. There was a lot of work to be done before it was functional.

Right now Rocket was probably still curled up in the pet bed, sleeping off his meal. Thor said he slept for the better part of a day the last time he ate this much.

"Probably," Tony muttered. He spoke to the ceiling. "Friday, contact Thor. Tell him the second - the second, mind you - he's free he needs to get back here. We've got a problem."  



	7. Intervention

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes you need to talk to a friend in trouble. And sometimes you can’t take ‘no’ for an answer when you decide to.

Thor was in a hurry.

When he wasn't, he could arrive with relative stealth. He could walk in, for example. Or fly. Barring the theatrical clap of thunder that often heralded his arrival he could be quiet about it.

But not if he was in a hurry. Tony's first warning was the entire tower shuddering and a rainbow flash from the surveillance cameras. He didn't need to ask Friday what was happening. He made it to the helipad level just in time to see Thor enter. Had the doors been a fraction slower to open the Thunder God would have walked right through them, armorglass or not. The helipad was still smoldering, intricate Norse patterns burned into the metal and rubber.

"You said there was an emergency, Stark," he said without breaking stride. "Something to do with Rocket."

Tony had to half run to keep up. Nebula and Pepper appeared from a conference room and joined the race.

"It's that battlesuit he was working on. He's built a jump rig into it and he's going to dump the rig's whole power system into it when he gets close to Thanos."

"Warp bomb," Thor muttered. "I knew I shouldn't leave him alone. There's nothing more dangerous than a man with nothing to lose."

"What will happen when he sets it off?"

"It'll rip a hole in the universe. No one knows what happens to the things that get sucked in. Sometimes it makes a permanent tear and bad things come through. I know what he's thinking."

"Thanos is invincible in our universe. But maybe not in another?"

"That's right." Friday snapped the outer doors of Rocket's entry hall open, again saving them from needing to fix a Thor-shaped hole.

The inner door was closed, of course. The two doors were never open at the same time. Thor didn't bother to talk to the ceiling this time. He walked straight to the door and jammed the blade of Stormbreaker into the crack where it met the frame.

Tony knew how tough that door was. He'd worked out that the weakness had to be the locking mechanism or frame. It was easy to dismiss Thor as a powerful but stupid Viking oaf but that was a mistake. He was from a spacefaring civilization and almost certainly knew more about certain technologies than Tony did.

He'd spotted the same weakness in the door and leaned on the handle of his axe, great muscles standing out of his back and arms. The door held out for perhaps two seconds before Thor gave a mighty yank. Metal snapped somewhere as the door slid open. Thor was through, having barely broken stride.

"You should stay here," Tony said to Pepper. That went about as well as expected. She walked right past him into the dark, raccoon-scented room, Nebula at her side. Tony sighed and tapped his chest unit. By the time he went through the door he was fully armored save his face. Hopefully Rocket wouldn't shoot him in it.

"Don't touch anything," Nebula growled as they entered. "He likes traps."

Thor wasn't listening. He went straight to the corner where Rocket usually worked and pulled up just shy of the workbench. When Tony reached him he saw Rocket curled up in the little pet bed, still sound asleep.

The thin cloth of the raccoon's worn-out worksuit had torn, exposing Rocket's back, and Tony grimaced at the exposed bolts and the scars around them. He'd seen burn scars that looked less painful.  
"I guess it was a false alarm. Sorry, Thor." He whispered. "Not an emergency just...yet?"

Thor reached out a thick finger and tapped the Zune on the workbench.

Instantly the Jackson Five stopped playing. Nothing else changed. The softly breathing raccoon stayed where he was, sleeping peacefully. For just an instant as the music died Tony would swear he head a whine like a tormented animal, then it was gone.

"Thor, what -"

The Thunder God plucked a hex nut from the bench and flicked it at Rocket. He was already turning away when the nut went right through the raccoon and bounced out of the bed. He knew before it hit that it wasn't really Rocket in the bed.

"I know you're still here, rabbit. Come out and talk."

In the absence of music the noise of machinery crept in. The assembly line was stamping out parts as it always did. There was no one to snap them together them into weapons now and a growing pile of stamped metal accumulated at the end of the bench.

"All right, rabbit. If I must." Thor walked to the brightest part of the room and scooped up one of the flower pots.

"You put that back!" An amplified voice boomed out as the massive battlesuit sprang to life. Spotlights flashed from its shoulders, spearing the Thunder God in brilliant light. "You put that back right now!"

"Is this what you want, rabbit?" Thor hadn't taken Stormbreaker from its place on his back. "For the last words you say to your friends to be a threat?"

"I...you're not..I don't have any..." The suit shuddered, the raised weapons drooping. After a moment it slumped where it stood. "Please. It's all...it's all I have left."

Thor put the flower pot with its dried brown twig back on the table. He still held the Zune. "I'll turn the music back on if you come out, rabbit."  
"I..." the suit shifted uncertainly.  


"If it were functional you'd have teleported away by now, Rocket," Pepper said. "Come out and talk to us."

There was a click as the armored plates parted. Rocket slid out, skinny as ever and with a spot of blood above one eye. He must have dived headlong into the suit as they entered. Without a word he walked past Nebula, Pepper, Tony and even Thor to pick up the closest flower pot from the bench. In a motion so automatic he must have repeated it a thousand times he watered it and the other two. When he sat down with the pot between his legs and looked up Tony saw that his eyes were wet.

"It's all I got," the raccoon said. "All I got to remember them by. I got to get him. I got to find a way."

Thor thumbed the music back on and Rocket relaxed a bit. Tony didn't know what to say. What he did say was not the right thing. "Rocket, we've all lost people."

"What do you know, Stark," the raccoon snarled. "You always had somethin'. Sure, you lost people, but you always had somethin'. She knows." He pointed at Nebula. "She knows what its like to have nothin' but hate." 

Rocket slumped where he sat. "When I got out of that lab that's all I had. That's what I was. A thing of pure hate. Hate and workin' with my hands is all that kept me goin'. Then I met Groot an' I had a fr...a friend."

He poked morosely at the damp soil around the dead brown twig in the pot. "Groot died, but a little bit of him lived on. It kept me goin'. And I got more friends..."

He flinched as Nebula came close enough to reach him, gently stroking the raccoon's nape. He still slammed his hand against the floor with shocking force.

"And now it's all gone! I can't be that thing again. I can't just have hate. I can't start over from nothin' again. Not again."

His eyes turned to the suit. "You gotta let me do it. It's all I got."

"You should have told me, Rocket." Nebula was gently petting his neck. "I would have helped."

Thor opened his mouth but Tony jumped in before the Thunder God could opt in on the suicide mission. "Rocket, it's suicide. It probably won't work anyway."

Rocket growled. Tony was amazed Nebula didn't yank her one fleshy hand away. "Don't you get it? Do ya think I'd be doing this if there was another way? It's the only thing that may work!"

He slammed his palm into the deck again. "When the gravity bomb didn't work I shoulda known. That woulda killed the pirate angel here," he inclined his head to Thor, "Ten times over and I saw him take a blast from a star. The gravity, the radiation, the blast. That was my best shot."

He sighed. "But I was stubborn. Gravity bomb didn't work, so I tried antimatter. Hard gamma from that didn't work so I tried a nova bomb. That didn't work so I tried monowire. But I shoulda known. He was just humoring me. He thinks I'm funny."

Tony spoke up. "How do you know?"

"Because he told me! Right after the monowire his floating blue head appeared in here. I jumped at him to claw his eyes out but it was just a projection. He said...said I was why the universe was too full of life. Things like me. 'Abominations'." Rocket shrugged. "Nothing I ain't heard before. Then he said it was funny, a worthless little thing like me tryin' to kill him. That if I wanted a shot at him to come myself. After that the bombs just disappeared. But he didn't kill me, even though he could. Snap of his fingers, dead."

He turned to the suit again. "He likes to fight. He'll let me get close so he can kill me hand ta hand. Then..." he shrugged. "Drax once said he'd make a hat out of me. 'Drax the destroyer and his coonskin cap'. Can't make a hat if there's nothin' left. When I dump all that power into the drive the suit will blow. I'll go, but I may take Thanos with me."

The horrible thing was that he was making sense. Tony might have tried it himself if he'd thought of it. Thanos had learned how to use the Stones now. Nothing could even approach him unless he allowed it and nothing at all could hurt him. Not in this universe, anyway.

"If I don't get him he'll do it again in a few years, y'know," Rocket said. "More people gone. More families torn up. It's gotta stop. Someone's gotta get him, and no one will miss one little monster."  
"I would miss you, rabbit," Thor said, and Nebula nodded. "But there's something more. Something you're missing."

Tony picked up that thread. "If you send Thanos into a universe where the Stones don't work, they're gone forever."

Rocket shrugged. "Good."

"Rocket, you're smart. I've been following your work for months now, in the Benatar and now here on Earth. You're brilliant. Smarter than I am, in some ways. But you aren't the only smart one around. Getting rid of the Stones is a mistake."

"Why?" Even were he standing, Rocket would have to crane his neck to meet Tony's gaze. "You gonna take 'em from Thanos and use 'em?"

"If we get the Stones," Thor said. "We can bring our friends back. Our families."

Rocket's mouth twisted. "How? He's flarking invincible! You can't overpower him, you can't kill him. I tried! The only thing worse than a black hole bomb is a nega-bomb and the Kree already hit him with one a those!"

"Rocket." Tony sat cross-legged so the raccoon wouldn't have to stare up at him. "Rocket, I'll make you a deal." 

"Whatever, Stark."

"I'll give you whatever you need, all the material and help you need to finish that." Tony jabbed a finger at the suit. "But when its done we lock it up for a year so you won't be tempted."

Rocket's eyes narrowed. "And what do I get out of this? I could finish it myself if you clowns quit butting in."

"Give me a year. Help me. We'll get the smart people together and see if we can figure out a way. If we can't, you help me make a suit like yours and we'll both go."

"Tony," Pepper said, but Thor spoke over her.

"He killed my brother in front of me. Slaughtered half my people. Killed a good friend. I'm going too."

"If anyone gets to kill my father it's me," Nebula said. "You're not going without me."

"So, it's settled," Tony said with a levity he did not feel. He'd just signed on to the suicide pact, after all. Pepper's expression told him he'd be hearing about it later. "If we can't find a way, we go after Thanos together."

"Just so you know," Rocket said. "The second I get close to him I'm blowing the suit. Even if some of you are there. He's gotta go. No matter what it costs."

"We'll talk about that in a year, Rocket," Thor said, and the little raccoon let out a sigh of something like contentment as the Thunder God turned up the volume on the Zune. Any song would do, but it helped that it was one of his favorites. The Chain. It reminded him of the time he almost lost his family and time he got them back.

Now he would get them back again. Or he would die. There was no third option. He couldn't be alone again. He wasn't strong enough.

It started as a sniffle as he held the flower pot between his knees. In seconds he was shaking, harsh sobs shaking his body as he let out all the pent-up grief. For three months he'd held it back with hate and determination but now it came poring out.

Rocket hated it when he broke down like this. It'd happened before. It was happening again. He couldn't bottle it up forever. Eventually it had to come out. It helped that this time, as with the last, there as someone to hold him as he sobbed. 

In this case, four people. Tony, looking confused but sympathetic. Thor, holding him tight and knowing exactly what he was going through. Pepper, who didn't know him at all but still held his arm and petted him as he cried.

And Nebula, the only person he knew who'd had it as bad as him. Nebula, who had even less of a life than he did. He at least had won his independence early and no matter how miserable he was and how many times they kicked him and threw him in jail, he always escaped. He had his independence. Nebula didn't even have that. She'd only escaped Thanos's control recently and the titan had mangled her even worse than the researchers mangled him. Nebula, the closest thing to a sister he had.

When he'd finally cried himself out Rocket sat back, sniffled, and wiped his nose. Fine. That was done. Time to move on. The first words out of his mouth were predictable.

"Who do I have to kill to get a drink around here?"

"I'll get you something to drink," Tony said. "If you'll take a shower."

For the first time in three months the raccoon's muzzle curved in the ghost of a smile. "Deal."


	8. The rules

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Having talked Rocket down from his suicidal focus on killing Thanos, Tony and Thor impose some rules on the raccoon.

There were new rules. Rocket didn't like them much.

It was Thor who fetched the beer after the little group broke into Rocket's lab and talked him down. Nebula didn't drink, Tony was a teetotaler, and Pepper just sipped as the god and the raccoon got drunk together. They both had a lot of sorrow to drown.

Thor recovered first, and while Rocket was still woozy they hashed out the rules. They were as follows:

Rule One: Rocket had to drop the damping fields and let Friday into the lab. This was to enforce Rules Two Through Six.

Rule Two: No more planet killers. If he needed to build something that destructive he could wait until the new labs in the asteroid belt and Lagrangian points were operational. If he wanted that done faster he was welcome to help.

Rule Three. He would budget no less than six hours a day for sleep. He could split it up into naps or one long doze but six hours was a minimum.

Rule Four: No more recycled food. He would eat no less than two meals provided by the staff a day and at least one had to be outside the lab.

Rule Five: He had to shower no less often than once a week. Were he human it would be once a day, but he didn't sweat. He still got dirty and smelly, but a shower a week about covered that.

Rule Six: Not counting mealtimes, Rocket had to come out of the lab for at least one uninterrupted hour per day. He could do what he wanted, but it couldn't be in the lab. Joint work with others during this time was allowed.

Rocket griped about wasting time he could better spend working, but even he knew his current work habits weren't healthy and he soon knuckled under.

After much grumbling he agreed that his first venture outside the lab in three months would be to attend a lunch and meeting with Tony, Bruce, a few other tech savants and (via telepresence) Shuri to discuss improving Earth's space defenses.

It was a strange meeting. At first Rocket just ate like a famished animal and ignored everyone, but his ears pricked up as projections and diagrams displayed the work in progress. The very first thing he said was blunt and surprisingly helpful.

"No," he growled as the orbit plots for the yet-to-be-constructed orbital defense platforms were displayed. "Three in a rosette is not enough. You need two low orbit and three high orbit just in case anyone gets past the outer forts. Otherwise you may end up firing at your own planet." He snatched the remote from Tony and quickly sketched out an orbit plot for the two groups of satellites.

Shuri blinked curiously from her holo. "Oh! That is good. But isn't there still a moving window in the orbit where someone could sit in a blind spot?"

" 'Course there is," Rocket snapped. He mellowed as he spoke, though. "That's why you put mines there. Basic planetary defense."

He was clearly happy to be engaged by minds at his own level and bit by bit, over the next week, his reluctance to come out of his hole faded. They no longer had to roust him out of the lab for the lunch get-togethers and three days later, without being prodded, he started coming out for dinner too.

Over that week his appearance improved markedly. His thin fur filled out, the sunken circles around his eyes disappeared, and the tremor in his hands faded and was finally gone. He gained at least a couple of pounds and on his little frame that showed. He was sleeping, and eating. Friday made sure of the one, and his new eagerness for - or at least tolerance of - social contact saw to the other.  


Under ironclad orders to treat their newly social mechanic well and aware that there was far too much work for their present workforce, the staff happily welcomed the furry little techie. Rocket seemed surprised and even a bit grateful to receive such respect and other than growling at most (but not all) attempts to pet him he soon settled in, for at least a few hours a day, as part of the team.

He also heard the arcade games in the rec room, and drawn in by the sound, started spending some time there. Rocket proved to be completely lethal with plastic guns, unbeatable as a pilot, and amazing at every game that wasn't DDR. Because Rocket couldn't dance worth a damn.

Tony found him there one day and introduced the little raccoon to chess. He beat Rocket easily the first game, won a long war of attrition the second and watched with astonishment as he was destroyed in the third.

"You've played this before," Tony said as Rocket's little clawed fingers plucked a knight off the board. One of Tony's knights, naturally. "Quill taught you, right?"

"Nope. It's basic tactics. And y'know, I was built for tactics." Rocket shrugged. "I just think eight, ten moves ahead."

Tony morosely moved a bishop. Rocket instantly moved a pawn one space forward. It didn't look like a threatening move but Tony wasn't fooled.

"I'll get your other Kymellian next," Rocket said, and touched Tony's remaining knight. "Six moves 'till I get your Supremor." He pointed a claw at Tony's king.

Tony considered the board position. He was pretty sure it was hopeless. He was only mildly interested in chess but that didn't mean he was bad at it and he'd never been dismantled by a beginner before. It just went to show what intellect lurked in that little raccoon skull. The prickly, socially awkward raccoon was brilliant...but not in all ways.

For example, he was a lousy liar.

"You did it on purpose," he said as he considered his next move.

"What, took your Kymellian?"

Tony looked up from his pieces. "You knew I'd see the suit and wonder about it. If you'd wanted to keep it secret you could have hidden it like you did when you wanted us to think you were asleep. Put a hologram over it."

"Dunno what you're talking about, Stark. Everybody makes mistakes." He pushed another pawn. Tony could see what he was doing now, leaving his remaining pieces fewer and fewer safe places to move. Another move or two and Tony's queen side defense would collapse.

Tony sat back, the game forgotten. "Rocket, I've spent months looking at your work. I respect it, and you. So please do me a favor and stop assuming I'm an idiot. You let Nebula and me see the suit. You knew I'd call Thor and what would happen when I did."

Rocket studied the board for a moment, then sighed and sat back as well. "All right, Stark. You're smart for a humie. Especially with this crap tech you have to work with." He sat and pondered for a moment before going on.

"I'm pretty sure I am right. Nothing's gonna work except maybe this warp overload. It may get Thanos. But I figure even that's got a ten, maybe fifteen percent chance of killing him."

He looked up. "So yeah. Maybe I do want you to talk me out of it. I'll give you a chance. You got a year. If we don't have my gang of idiots back by then, or a good shot at it, I'm still doing it. You don't have to go with if you don't want. I won't hold you to it. Or the pirate angel. Nebula is gonna come whether I want her to or not. But alone or in a group, I won't hesitate to die for just a chance to take out the guy who killed my friends."

And that was it, the grim center of it. Even when Rocket was smiling, thankfully not as rare an event as it once was, he still missed his family.

So Tony, and Shuri, and Banner, and Pym, and all the others they called in, sat around the table with Rocket and hashed it out. They worked on Earth's expanding space presence, on planetary defense, on infrastructure, on making a planet work with half the people it used to have. And they worked on ways to get to Thanos. They'd find a way. 

"I'm pretty sure I'm right," Rocket had said. That only made Tony more determined to prove him wrong. He'd get Rocket's family back. He'd get everybody's family back, no matter what.

One hurt little raccoon locked in a lab had driven home the fact that Tony wasn't the only one who lost something when Thanos snapped his fingers. And now he'd work with the raccoon and everyone else to fix it.

Because if he didn't, Rocket was going to go off and die in an almost certainly futile effort to kill Thanos. He wasn't the only one. Now that he had access to galactic news he knew that every time an empire found Thanos's newest hidey hole they threw everything that had at the Titan and promptly took massive casualties.

He'd heard the argument that Thanos was right. And there were some civilizations that did benefit from their losses. But populations would continue to grow and sooner or later Thanos would do it again. More broken families. More lives lost on an incalculable scale.

It was accept an unseen, but very present universal despot or fight. Tony was going to fight. It only took one little raccoon holed up in his tower to convince him that it was not just the right, but the only thing to do.


End file.
